GULLIVER’S TRAVELS
US, 2010, 88 minutes, Colour.
Jack Black, Emily Blunt, Amanda Peet, Jason Segel, Billy Connolly, Catherine Tate, Christopher O’ Dowd.
Directed by Rob Letterman.
Come to think of it, my first awareness of Gulliver’s Travels was Dave Fleischer’s 1939 animated version which I really enjoyed and gave me some images of Lilliput which stood me in reasonable stead as I later read Jonathan Swift’s satirical 1726 novel. I may have read the Classic Comic version as well.
Which means that this version of Gulliver’s Travels is for youngsters learning the story and for those who don’t intend to read Swift himself. This is the goofball version.
Jack Black is Jack Black, no smaller than he used to be and still suffering from a poor self-image, despite his flamboyant humour, and still stuck on rock and roll. So, this is the Gulliver that Dean Swift never dreamed of. To find critics and members of the public expecting it to be a ‘faithful film version’ are in need of reality checks. This is a live-action, cartoon version full of ‘cool’ and ‘dudes’ from Manhattan that uses the basic Lilliput story with an excursion to Brobdingnag that is designed for a chuckle and, perhaps, some shots at Americanising culture. (The theatre scenes where the Lilliputians are so moved by Gulliver’s version of The Empire Strikes Back and the end of Titanic where Gulliver is ‘king of the world’ as well as all the lights and posters he gets the people to build to transform a very British Lilliput into Times Square (ads for Gavatar and Galvin Klein), did raise a laugh.
Gulliver has worked in the mail room at a New York publishers, has not had the courage to confess his crush to Darcy, the travel editor. When he pretends to be a writer, off he is sent to the Bermuda Triangle and look where the waves send him.
The Lilliput episodes are as you might expect, although the hero is the tall Horatio, a commoner (Jason Segel) who has a crush on the Princess (Emily Blunt doing a persuasive haughty). Gulliver does a Cyrano de Bergerac to help Horatio woo the Princess. Billy Connolly, Scots accent and all, is the king while Catherine Tate is the queen, both welcome presences. However, Chris O’ Dowd as General Edward, all pomp and ridiculosity in the ra-ra British vein is a very welcome comic villain and traitor.
Darcy comes looking for Gulliver and finishes up in Lilliput as well where Gulliver becomes the hero he formerly boasted about being, saves Lilliput and declares his love for Darcy.
And then he bursts into song, as if it were the culmination of a Broadway musical, king, queen, princess and Horatio and the populace all joining in, including the rulers from rival Blefiscu who keep invading Lilliput. The song is Edwin Starr’s 1969 anti-Vietnam war song,War.
So, a jolly little lowbrow film, in 3D, which can easily be superseded by the next film version of the book, and a message that we should be ourselves, that pomposity is absurd – and so is war.
1. The popularity of Jonathan Swift’s novel, its status as literature? Satire, human nature, society? The critique?
2. The tradition of film versions, comic and serious?
3. Adaptation to the 21st century, 21st century American humour, the goofy and cool, American sensibilities? For slackers?
4. Jack Black, his screen persona, size, image, self, self-deprecation, scenes of vanity? The musical background? The jokes?
5. The special effects, for 3D, for two dimensions? The wave, Lilliput and people’s size, the models of the city, the interactions with the small people, the buildings and movement, the fleet, the arrows, the sequence in Brobdignag and Gulliver being small?
6. A 21st century Gulliver, Jack Black’s performance, presence, jokes, in the mailroom, ten years, shy? Sarah and the lift? His awkwardness? Her being his boss? Writing the articles, the commissions, borrowing? Sarah and her reaction? Sending him sailing, the experience, the storm?
7. Lilliput, the king and queen, the humour (and the accents)? Their puzzle about Gulliver, the princess? Gulliver tied up, moved, talking, the president of Manhattan, gaining respect, the theatre, pretending the story of Titanic was his, Star Wars? His putting out the fire by urinating? The hero? Cultivating enemies?
8. Christopher O’ Dowd as the villain, very British, the stuffy villain? His relationship with the princess? Rivalry? Gulliver and putting him down, his response to the theatrical items? Spying, exiled, collaborating with the enemy, helping them attack?
9. Jason Segel as the hero, imprisoned, the commoner, his love for the princess, the mocking of formalities, becoming free, the Cyrano de Bergerac coaching of the hero with the princess and her falling in love?
10. Gulliver, self-promotion, Times Square, Titanic, cowardice, disillusionment with him? Exile?
11. Brodbignag, Gulliver small? Escaping? The little girl being a big girl?
12. The return, Sarah’s arrival? The mobile phone, testing? Sharing the experience?
13. Gulliver proving himself? The ships, the battle? Hero?
14. Lilliput and the enemies? Peace? Gulliver and Sarah and their new life?
15. The themes of Swift’s satire, on people, on the Lilliputians and their image of themselves – but also on Gulliver and his self-deception and
